I fielded a phone call today because there was no journal entry yesterday. I intended to write, but was too tired. I am astounded at the growing magnitude of this site. Such wonderful friends! – I desperately want to email each of you back personally, but cannot pull that off right now. Could comment here on each entry – but that would be chapters.

Was thinking, as I do on a daily basis, about life overseas. Even though we’ve been retired since 1994 we never “left” mentally; this stateside living still seems temporary, like a long repat.

After seven wonderful years in Libya, a few months in the states for re-grouping, we arrived in Abqaiq in 1973. We were assigned a port-a-camp where the oil sand blew off the oiled “greens” of the newly formed golf course a few yards away, and onto the clothes hanging on our clothesline. Some nights a bagpiper would walk the “greens”, practicing - I loved the wail of his bagpipes. We arrived in July, and had hot water through the summer, into the late fall. Eventually the water was never hot, so called minor maintenance who discovered the hot water heater had never been hooked up to electricity! Our hot water till that time had been solar heated! Finally we were assigned a rowhouse, with reliable hot water, but no carpet, just that 1950s tile. In those days, the thing to do was order carpet through Carlton Duke, a wonderful man of many trades. The carpet finally arrived from the states, a roll about four feet in diameter and 12 feet long and weighed – well, tons. It was delivered into the rowhouse, and there it lay, a gigantic mistake. Who was going to lay it? Who could maneuver such weight? Henry came in from the rig the next week, and started in, with some muscle and a carpet knife. I was not exactly hysterical, but could not see much progress there with just us, so I made many suggestions about calling everyone we knew for help – like the old fashioned barn raising. Henry just looked at me and said, “I will not ask anyone for help. Your friends show up.” And indeed, within the hour and without any biding, first appeared Larry Benchich and then Jary Archer, and they laid carpet far into the night. There may have been others – but I remember those two – this was before Marie and Jane came as wives.

Stalling again – yesterday was a quiet day – Henry did pretty well. Got him into the Dodger recliner for a few hours, but when it was time to get him back into bed, our muscle man Bobby was not available. But there were three of us – Anne, John and myself. We thought we were competent, but not quite. We almost landed Henry on the floor – this would have been funny had it not been so desperate. We learned our lesson – wait for the muscle. We finally got him into the bed, and I swore we would never put him through our incompetence again.

Today he as eaten three times!!!! -even a little ice cream and chocolate chip cookie. But today is different. Henry is hot, then cool. He has not been out of bed at all today. Dear April the Aide commented this morning how yellow he is becoming. I’ve noticed, but not wanted to face it. Looking back, I think now he has had liver malfunction for a long time. For several years now he has had a yellow pallor. And, the day after the colon cancer surgery three years ago this month, the surgeon, in his account of how things went, commented that during surgery he noticed Henry has the strangest misshapen liver he has every encountered in his practice, which at the time just seemed an oddity. I’ve started giving him morphine about every four hours and that seems to keep him relatively comfortable. Later this evening his breathing was very labored, but has eased up some now. Many of you who have written about this experience identify with this time – any advice is welcome. Last week he asked several times “who won the Superbowl?” So, I had it on tonight, with low volume, but he didn’t seem to notice.

Thank you again, all who have written, who care, -you all are such comfort.

Bonnie and the Cook Family.